VIDEO: Sørloth Scores A Genuinely Impressive Goal Against Charlton

Alexander Sørloth hasn’t had the best of times of late, struggling for first-team minutes and fluffing his lines whenever he is brought off the bench, the Norwegian will have been over the moon to score a genuinely impressive goal during the Eagles’ 4-0 U23 victory over Charlton Athletic yesterday afternoon.

Sørloth was brought off the bench in Palace’s last outing at Selhurst Park against Tottenham Hotspur, only to see a close-range effort saved by Spurs captain Hugo Lloris in the closing stages. Given Palace’s continued struggles in front of goal in SE25, (we still haven’t scored there from open play this season) it was a miss that left thousands frustrated and Alexander himself questioning what he has to do to break his Premier League duck.

The subsequent international break wasn’t kind to the big man either, with two gilt-edged opportunities to score squandered in the latter stages of Norway’s 2-0 victory over Cyprus, leading to thousands of shares on social media platforms. Under such scrutiny, it would have been easy for Alex to wilt but to his credit, he got stuck in against Charlton and grabbed a truly impressive goal for his troubles, as you can see above.

Dribbling the ball into the penalty area, he’s worked a shooting angle and drilled it low and hard into the bottom corner of the Addicks goal; the sort of finish Palace’s scouts have been hoping to see on a regular basis from the moment we paid Midtjylland to take him off their hands back in January. Should he ever manage to replicate it in the Premier League, you’d hope the confidence would start to flow through his game immediately but in his defence, he’ll need to be trusted in order to get up and running.

It’s a conundrum Roy Hodgson is left with every week, clearly feeling as though the team is more dynamic with Zaha and Townsend dovetailing as a make-shift forward pair whilst knowing all too well that the XI lacks any real firepower. As a direct result, Sørloth is limited to cameos off the bench but at home to Burnley this weekend, it’s difficult to know which option the gaffer will choose.

5 Comments

RH obviously sees more than us in training every week so will bow to his superior knowledge. However, in the games I’ve seen of him admittedly only on TV (travelling to the UK over Xmas and desperately trying to get a ticket to a game) he doesn’t seem to me personally to have the goods for the premier league. His effort against spurs looked as if he tried to smash the cover off the ball instead of looking at where to put it. In his defence maybe he couldn’t believe the opportunity he had so rushed it in his excitement to get off the mark. That would just be a maturity thing. I hope I’m wrong but wonder whether giving Kaikai a chance would improve our chances as Sørloth just doesn’t seem to have it.

I agree with Ben. He is young and relatively inexperienced. His effort against Tottenham was what you would expect of someone young wanting desperately to score their first premier league goal and help his club. He tried to smash it as hard as he could. Perhaps with time he can improve and start scoring, get confident and develop into a Premier League quality striker.
Unfortunately I also agree with tzcar – he is not currently the answer to our goal scoring woes. We don’t have the luxury of time to wait for him to adapt and mature.
Personally, I would love to see Kaikai given a chance if for no other reason than that he is quick and unknown. It’s not like we’d be swapping him out for a proven and in-form goal scorer so what have we got to lose?
Still desperately clinging to the hope that Benteke returns as 17 goal a season Benteke rather then the couldn’t hit a cow’s arse with a banjo Benteke.